We agree
It’s funny this topic came up. I’ve been tweaking a budget 2-way design and noticed soundstage depth & width getting better as I swapped out parts. Curious to see how far I had strayed from the original squiggles, I took a quick measurement last night and found my reverse null is not as deep as when I started, but soundstage is quite a bit better.
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I am not at all surprised. I decided to revisit BW3 slopes on one speaker with a very shallow reverse null and it was shockingly better. Also I got the XO point down to 1200, so that probably helped as well. And I did not attempt to preserve tweeter sensitivity. It is -15 Db at XO. It has a very large main lobe with a downward tilt so I may install some taller feet on front legs.
1/24th smoothing
The subs are not on. They don’t make such a big difference to the squiggles but a tremendous difference to the ears. Speaker Sunday.
I tipped these speakers back by moving the rear wheel axel up 3/4 inch, but I still preferred the sound when I was seated and I do not typically listen to music that way. So on my walk I thought why not invert the tweeter since it is close to odd order slopes and tweak the components in VCAD to an acceptable response. It mostly worked. I now hear no difference between seated and standing, but the response is not as smooth. These are pretty heavy so I will check the polars later. It seems that I have inverted my process along with my tweeters, at least for now while they are both on the floor and I know the ballpark XO. I have never gotten what I would consider an awesome center image with these so I need to try things and I am still the new guy so why not. I have been using laminated iron core inductors when the values go above 1mH, they are cheaper and lower DCR. This is an 8 Ohm mid operating from 200 to 1200 and I have already shaved 15 Db off the tweet so a half Db more from coil DCR is not a big deal, so I substituted some 18 gauge air coils and I now have a center image. I know that these topics can create some spirited discussions so discuss away.
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Sometimes I find the even directivity systems lack focus and sound more diffuse, whereas the LR4 locks in a bit better. Just my opinion. Half way between can help perspective.
The deal with the coils could be that an air core sounds a bit ‘dryer’ at times and does not induce any emphasis in the midbass like an Icore can.
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I agree, It not necessary to try and mimic textbook examples. Somewhere in-between is were most of us live.
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I have never had a textbook crossover work for me. Meaning, the Q is the same on both slopes. In the real world with real drivers and real impedance curves, it just won’t happen.
Pebbles in our shoes. It is small but considerable.
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Anyone care to agree with Danny Ritchey? He states that iron core inductors smear the sound or image, I don’t exactly remember what he says but I doubt I will ever use Iron core inductors unless on woofers in a three way.
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IMO he has some decent info to provide at times. But you need to know enough on the subject to know when he is overblowing the benefits of other things… Like when he is pushing some of his own products.
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Wait, let me pop the popcorn…
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When I did the coil test in 2016, I found air cores to sound a bit ‘drier’ than the rest tested, and after a while, noticed I-cores tend to have an emphasis around 70Hz. SuperQ are not immune either.
The C-coils seem to have emphasis at a lower center freq than I-cores and yield a perceived favorable fullness, but don’t sound as peaky as I-cores do.
My ferrite ring-cores don’t seem to have emphases as far as I can tell.
I recall talking to a guy of Greek heritage at PE, a very smart guy. We talked about how much sound transmits though the cabinet and what a big deal it is, and I new he was correct. So I tried a constrained layer construction idea and it is a big deal. A big difference. It is much easier now for me to prefer one crossover over another. I do not know what some instruments should sound like but I am familiar with human voice, so that has become my test.